The Footnote Method

Footnotes are a different way of referencing your information. Footnoting means inserting a number at the end of a sentence for each reference. You then provide the corresponding bibliographic information in the form of a note at the foot of the page or at the end of the essay (endnotes) before the reference list. Either way, you mark the numbers consecutively in the order in which the references appear in the essay (for example, from 1 to 30), never repeating a number even when starting a new page. The footnotes literally appear at the ‘foot’ of each page of the essay.The first reference to a book or article in a footnote must provide the same full bibliographic details as you would provide in a bibliography or reference list. After that, if you reference the same book or article, you can use Latin abbreviations such as:

•         ibid. (short for ibidem, meaning ‘in the same place’). The abbreviation ‘ibid.’ is used to refer to the same reference as the one immediately above it.

•         op. cit. (shortfor opere citato, meaning ‘in the work cited’). The abbreviation ‘op. cit.’ is used to refer to an item that has already been referenced in full earlier in the essay, but which doesn't follow directly from the one above. Always include the name of the author along with the ‘op. cit.’ to avoid any confusion.

It is important to note that these Latin abbreviations are always in lower case roman font with the full-stops included.

The Vancouver system

The Vancouver referencing system is common in health science disciplines. It involves the use of endnotes, but differs greatly from the footnoting system. It is the simplest but least detailed of the four systems of referencing discussed in this guide. In the Vancouver system, the endnotes and reference list are one and the same. In essence, you construct a list of references or a bibliography of all of your references used in the essay, and number them in the order in which they appear. Therefore, the number of each reference in the text refers to the entry in the reference list at the end of the essay.

The Vancouver system is less page specific than the Harvard, APA or footnote methods. It also involves a different method of writing the references in the reference list. Books and journal articles are not italicised or highlighted in any way, nor are any Latin abbreviations used. There are no quotation marks used for article or chapter titles. Article titles are often abbreviated using a form published in the catalogue Index Medicus (available in your library).

If you are studying subjects in a number of disciplines which require you to use different referencing methods, be careful not to confuse the four systems of referencing.